Sunday, November 20, 2011

How high does accountability go in Lake Forest filthy texting scandal?

At Sunday’s board meeting, Michael Beacham, a parent, told board members he believes they did a woefully bad job in handling this situation two years ago.

"I strongly urge Dr. Griffith to resign. I also strongly urge all board members who are on the board dating back to 2009 to do so well, if they had the same information," he said. "I believe we need new leadership in District 67 in order for this community to get past this."

That sounds about right to me.

The question that comes to mind is, "What didn't they know and when did they decide not to know it?"

Many District 67 parents have expressed outrage over the revelations, questioning why school officials and local police failed to seek more information in 2009.

Facing angry parents at a hastily called meeting this morning, the superintendent of the Lake Forest School District 67 said he will seek the dismissal of a middle school principal who used his work cellphone to send a sexually explicit photo and messages to a 22-year-old college student.

John Steinert, principal of Deer Path Middle School, pleaded guilty in 2009 to harassment by electronic communication, a misdemeanor, and was reprimanded* by the district. He was placed on leave this week after the Tribune began inquiring about the way the district handled the case.

But the question for Superintendent Harry Griffith is why it took a newspaper inquiry to pique his curiosity about the troubling charges against Steinert. From a longer story by Black we learn that the young woman who received sexually explicit texts from Steinert "filed her complaint in January 2009 with police in Gurnee...After an investigation, Steinert pleaded guilty to the harassment charge in May 2009. He was sentenced to a one-year conditional discharge, a $300 fine and 80 hours of community service."

As a result (of the conviction), the Lake Forest School District 67 issued a reprimand*, required him to seek counseling and temporarily froze his salary, Superintendent Harry Griffith said....

Griffith said that the district based its disciplinary action on a heavily redacted police report obtained through a Freedom of Information request to Gurnee police in January 2009. Griffith said the report at the time did not contain the graphic details of the texts that the principal sent to the woman, who had visited the school while serving a college internship with the Lake Forest Police Department.

Griffith provided a copy of the report he received from police in February 2009, which showed that the graphic portions of the texts were redacted because of the ongoing investigation....

Griffith said the district conducted its own investigation, during which another employee interviewed Steinert "multiple times." School officials did not interview the victim because the case "did not involve any minors or any employees," he said.

Umm....your middle school principal is arrested, charged and pleads guilty to a very ominous harassment charge, the police report is heavily redacted and you issue a reprimand*? You conduct an "investigation" that doesn't even get the victim's side?

Black quotes Diana Moore, who has two children at Deer Path: "My concern is primarily with the school board and superintendent. It seems like they brushed it under the carpet. "

Ya think?

I doubt this concern will go away quickly.

*UPDATE-- Black informs me that, Friday, Griffith withdrew the term "reprimand" and described his related communication with Steinert as "a firmly worded letter and poor evaluation." To which I can only put on my best Monty Python voice and shriek, "Not the firmly worded letter!"

Posted at 08:30:00 PM

Comments

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And from the Trib's account, there was nothing ambiguous about this harassment. The young lady repeatedly told this schmuck to leave her alone, to which he replied, "Stop being a tease." It's amazing to me that someone that clueless and lacking in self-control could reach a position of responsibility of any kind. It's appalling that he reached such a position in education.

An administrator accused/proven of sexual harassment, pornography, inappropriate attention to a minor child covered for by upper administrators of the district he works for?? Horrors!

Actually, this is not an uncommon occurence. Usually the administrator is moved to another school, paid off and allowed to leave the district, or just continues on in his position while the accuser is released and/or compensated.

A teacher arrested for these types of crimes makes instant news, but very rarely will administrative abuse come to light. Kudos to the reporters exposing this jerk.

The way that the school handled this situation is the reason why a lot of people who have experienced sexual harassment or sexual abuse never come forward. The complaints are swept under the rug and the victims are told to move along, nothing to see here.

I've been screaming for years about LF outrageously high salaries for administrators and their penchant for doing nothing in particular. More of the same. Somebody should look into what Griffith is getting paid. I think he's on the payroll of both the elementary district 115 and hs district 67 and he's making close to $400K. Good deal if you can get it.

Execs in the private sector generally don't make anything near what high level school adminstrators make for jobs at the same level. I ran a finance team and had P&L responsibility for a business with $1 billion repeat $1 billion in pre tax income and I wasn't getting anything close to $300K or $400 K.

More reason why employers in these situations need to hire qualified internal investigation counsel. Lisa Black is a good reporter, but hopefully investigation counsel would have gotten to the bottom of this pretty quickly including through interviews with the subject about the full content of the texts, on penalty of firing if he does not cooperate. It is also hard to believe that the content could not be obtained from the victim, particularly if the victim is told of the purpose of the investigation and of the need to verify the accuracy of what the subject said about the texts.

This could be wrapped up in a couple of days and probably for something in the five figures after completion of the report.

To rely on a redacted police report and on interviews in which the subject apparently was not forthcoming is really unbelievable.

Pan: did you read the article?? This did NOT involve a "minor child", it was a 22-year old woman. Big difference! I'm not saying by any means what he did was right, but let's get the facts right.

And he was already convicted of a misdemeanor, admitted what he did, was given his sentence, paid his fine, went to counciling, completed his community service - everything that was required of him. Now, years later, some reporter puts it on the front page of the newspaper for the world to see and judge him again?

Let's go back through ALL the court records and find every person who ever made a mistake, used poor judgement, was convicted of any wrongdoing, put it on the front page of the paper and get everyone fired and ruin their lives forever!

I agree fully that this man did something WRONG, and stupid. But I don't think what is happening now deserves any "kudos" to the reporter.

Many many Kudos to the reporter! And you,think that minors were not at risk here? Of course, people can make mistakes and pay the consequences, but they must not ever be around children! This principal, who has access to hundreds of middle school children on a daily basis, exposed his private parts and photographed them with accompanying filthy text-- sent them to a college student--who was interning at his school, and you think this "mistake" was worthy of a blank slate after a fine? Those with middle school aged children might not agree with you, Diane! Parents of 22 year old college students might not either!

Are you from Lake Forest? Do you have a child in this middle school? How would you feel knowing the principal of your child's school lusted after a college intern, was caught in the same indecent behavior a U.S. Congressman was forced to step down for? Yet, the principal should get a free pass?

I'm not too far from Lake Forest, we had our own disturbing incident a couple of months ago. A long time art teacher used a flash drive to subvert district security and upload child pornography on his classroom computer. He was arrested and immediately dismissed. Did he harm any children from his classes? The police believe he did not, neither were the children depicted on the drive from any of his classes that we know of. Should he have paid for his crime and be allowed to come back?

No, his crime was as illegal as the principal's crime, and he should be prevented from ever being near children again. Perversion and harassment come in many forms and never should the perps be allowed to work in public service where children are present. Any parent of school aged children would be creeped out by thinking a person capable of these kinds of behavior was close to their child on a daily basis. I know I was, my daughter was in this teacher's art class for two years. I'm still sick about it.

Every detail of this story is mind-numbing. The principal fulfilled his community service sentence at an outfit co-owned by one of his school's teachers, an organization serving disadvantaged kids -- and the superintendent didn't know that? The principal said his cell phone texts were merely "flirtatious" -- and the superintendant took his word for it? The school district didn't bother to ask the intern for her side of the story because she wasn't an employee? And the district then gave the principal a raise? What kind of special stupid are these people?

My understanding of pedophilia is that the predator homes in on victims within a specific age range, so I don't know for sure that the school's students were in any special danger. Still, there are a lot of 7th and 8th graders who are physically mature, and the notion that it's okay to let such an obsessive sexual harasser lead your school is nuts.

For what it's worth, I grew up next door to Lake Forest in Lake Bluff and went to LF high school. That was (too) long ago, but I don't remember a need for hastily called middle-of-the-day parent meetings to discuss perverto school staff and the clueless reactions of their superiors (both the superintendant and the school board). I hope the mother shown on the front page of today's Trib was telling Supt. Griffith that he should be fired along with the principal.

Kudos to you for trying to inject a note of rationality into the discussion. However I fear the hysteria has drowned you out. Hope you learned your lesson and will just shut up the next time you see the mob out to destroy someone and themselves in the process.

I agree with Diane. Based on what we know from the article, I am not sure this rises to the level of someone losing their job. He did not harass a subordinate. The woman was an intern with the LFPD. She came to the school 10 times with a policeman she was shadowing. The principal is without a doubt an idiot and obviously lacks some basic understanding of how to talk to woman. He was charged, convicted and paid a price. What he did was not directed towards a student or an underage person. A 22 year year old is probably a senior in college. Or maybe even a college graduate.
Yes, the incident should be in his employment file. He should be on probation at work and if anything else remotely weird like this comes up, then he should lose his job. But this seems like a massive over-reaction.
I wonder if there is more to the story.

Did we not just have the chance to rid ourselves of the BOE that clearly along with Griffith left a turd in a file? Thank you GJO'L, so true. And yet this comes back to haunt Steinert now? What prompted a reporter to find what the average gossip in this town couldn't? Will more interns be stepping forward?

--@wendy: are you kidding me? You're equating child pornography with an inappropriate relationship with a 22-year-old? And @john k, apparently equating the texting with child _rape_??

Perspective, people. Some wrong things are distinctly more awful than other wrong things. If we put every wrong thing, or every illegal thing, at the same level of badness, it just leads to outrage burnout and selective enforcement. This guy's an ass, but I see *no* evidence from what I've read here that he ever has or ever would act inappropriately towards children; nobody at all is well-served by an ill-conceived witch hunt.

ZORN REPLY -- I very much agree that there's no evidence that just because the guy's skeevy with young adult women that he's the least bit likely to behave inappropriately with the children in his charge. I don't think that's the issue. I think it's that you want as the principal of your school someone of good judgment and high moral character -- not a flawless person, but not one who sends pictures of his dingus to unwilling young women, either.
And you want your superintendent to be more vigilant in such matters.

No one is saying that it's okay for a man to send unsolicited photos of his genitalia to a woman. But people seem to be hung up on his age compared to the lady's, and the fact he used a company cell phone. Neither of these facts is relevant. If these had been consensual photos sent between two adults using their own personal cell phones, there would be no issue at all--at least in my mind. Maybe yours, though.

Let's see, sending pornographic pictures of yourself while virtually stalking a guest employee of your school not as serious as downloading pornography on a school computer? Really?!?!!!

Age of the victims has nothing to do with this. The inappropriate, illegal and immoral behaviors, immediate dismissal warnings of such are in every school labor contract, are the point. There are also strong rules concerning sexual harassment in every district. This superintendent was knowingly covering up for this principal, I don't believe for one minute his claims of not understanding how serious the charges were. Lake Forest parents are justified in their anger and should call for this man's dismissal.

Doesn't seem the role of a school board to play detective, interviewing victims, witnesses etc (who are under no obligation to talk to them anyway). That's the job of the police, and the police did investigate. Because the report was heavily redacted, the board should have stayed on it until the full report was released. All the needed information was in it.

As for the community service deal, in the words of Tom Magliazzi, sound b-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-gus.

You have limited access to police investigation findings and without an internal investigation, you don't have all the facts about what went wrong, not just with the employee conduct, but with the internal controls that should have been in place to prevent it, discover it, and act on it promptly and effectively. If you don't try to learn those facts and fix your internal controls, you risk other bad stuff happening and you finding out about it from people like Lisa Black.

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